Tuesday, March 25, 2014

'Playing' With Our Learning!

Sometimes the best ideas I have for teaching come from watching my sons play!

I have 2 boys that are 'true boys'- my house is filled with cars, trucks, dinosaurs, superheroes, etc! When I sit back and watch them play I learn from them...I learn how they learn, I learn how they problem solve and I even feel like I learn how to be a better teacher!

So this subtraction idea came straight from watching my boys play!

They raided my empty cardboard box container stash (I am gearing up to make decomposing monsters!) and started cutting them apart. They are very creative and can make the most amazing things from unstructured play! They have open access to scissors, markers, crayons, glue etc. So they often go about making things. I had no idea what they were up to- except for the fact that they were making a huge mess! And then I sat back and listened....

'Park it right here.' 'Oh no, there's an emergency so the ambulance has to leave.' 'Now I only have 3 emergency vehicles in my parking lot.' 'The emergency is over- the ambulance is back now.'

And so it continued...and I chimed in...

'How many cars are in your parking lot?' 'If the firetruck goes to the fire, how many will be left?' And they 'acted out' the scenarios I said by having their cars/trucks move in and out of the lot....

GENIUS boys! You are practicing addition and subtraction...and you have no idea!

So when they went in for naps, I went to the computer and made a parking lot, some simple word problems, and paper cars (I didn't think they would let me 'borrow' their cars for school math!)

My class is 'boy' heavy this year- 13 to 7- so I knew if I had the cars they would be even more excited!

So I grabbed a baby wipe container and took about 40 cars from the bottom of the toy box that I didn't think they would miss- I had to hide them- and the container worked like a charm!

I laid down the law...the cars are used to answer the math problems- if I find you are just 'playing' with them, I will have to take them and give you the paper ones instead!

And so our fun and learning began...

Pull a word problem card and 'read' it. Put that many cars in the lot.

Read the card to see how many cars drive out...and have them drive out!

Count how many cars are left in the lot.

Record your learning...Write how many you started with...

...how many drove away...

...and how many are left! And then read your number sentence!

They continued to pull cards, 'act' them out and record!

No one has had to use the 'dreaded' paper cars...yet!

This week we worked only with the subtraction word problems, but there is also an addition set in there. Next week addition and subtraction cards will be mixed and they will need to figure out if the cars are pulling out (subtraction) or driving into (addition) the lot!

I love your parking lot idea for teaching subtraction. I've wishlisted it on TPT in case I don't win it. Through the years, I 've done a lot of different things. My kids love eating to model subtraction. I have used pieces of cereal in a counting cup.

I love this idea so much! How simple (basically a tens frame), yet so motivating. You are right about learning from our kids. I feel like SUCH a better teacher after having kids of my own because they teach me so much. Thanks for linking up!